That's Life
by Howlin' Mara
Summary: What happens when one of the team fails to protect the girl who hired them? Songfic response, from Murdock's POV, to a challenge issued by Spee.


I wasn't going to post this here at first because I think it's too short and could probably stand some editing, but the reviews I got on my board convinced me to do it...

This is a songfic to Frank Sinatra's _That's Life_, and it was written in response to Spee/Mrs. T's challenge:

_Write a story in which the A-Team takes on a job and FAILS. As a result, an innocent dies.  
How do the individual members of the team react/cope?  
Mostly interested in the reaction here; if you don't actually want to write the mission in that's fine, but give us an idea of what happened. _

R&R!

* * *

Murdock flopped down on his bed at the VA, and stared blankly up at the ceiling. He hadn't felt this bad since...well, he couldn't even remember when. Probably 'Nam. 

His mind kept going back to that one moment before the girl had been shot. The look on her face as the shot had gone off haunted him everytime he shut his eyes. If only he had been paying better attention, and not playing around, she might still be alive. It had been his job to watch out for her, and now she was dead.

When he had caught up with the guys he saw it in their eyes: they blamed him. They blamed him, they would never say as much, but that didn't change anything, it was still his fault and they knew it.

The complete and utter silence in his room wasn't helping matters. He got up and crossed the room to the small radio on his dresser and turned it on, then tuned it to the oldies station he liked so much. A little music might at least keep his mind off of the guilt.

_That's life, that's what people say.  
You're riding high in april,  
Shot down in may.  
But I know I'm gonna change that tune,  
When I'm back on top in June._

Shot down in May. The words made him wince as he looked over at the calandar on his wall--May eighteenth.

"Appropriate song, though," he muttered quietly to himself. Before this he probably would have adapted a Sinatra-esque persona and sung along, but he found he didn't have the heart for it. Acting like that was what had gotten that girl killed.

Poor girl had only wanted to help her father, whose business was being threatened by a couple of thugs in suits.

_That's life, funny as it seems.  
Some people get their kicks,  
Steppin' on dreams;  
But I don't let it get me down,  
'cause this ol' word keeps getting around._

Her father.

That had been one hell of a conversation. Worst part was, he'd insisted on speaking to the man himself, to tell him that he himself had been the one responsible for the girl's death. Somehow, the fact that the men responsible had been locked up wasn't comforting to him, not that Murdock could blame the man. Had he been in that man's shoes, he would have reacted the same way.

_I've been a puppet, a pauper, a pirate,  
A poet, a pawn and a king.  
_

Maybe BA was right. Maybe it was time to stop acting so damned crazy all the time. He shook his head to clear it, and thought about the lyrics of the song.

I don't let it get me down.

Hannibal and Face had both tried to tell him that it wasn't his fault.

"What could you have done?" Hannibal had asked him. At the time he'd been unable to come up with an answer, and, he found, he still couldn't.

Perhaps they were right; he couldn't have done anything. Hell, it had been two days since Hannibal had asked him that question, and he still couldn't find an answer, though, not from lack of trying. How many dozens of times had he run the scenario through his mind?

_I've been up and down and over and out  
And I know one thing:  
Each time I find myself flat on my face,  
I pick myself up and get back in the race._

There was _nothing_ he could have done. Really, he'd known that all along, but somehow it didn't make the guilt go away. But, as the song went, that's life. And as long as he didn't have the power to turn back time he would have to live with what had happened and deal with it.

Luckily 'Nam and the CIA had been great teachers for dealing with guilt.

From the corner of his room he grabbed a hat that looked very much like Sinatra's favourite hat, and put it on. He plastered a very phony, but very convincing smile on his face and sang loudly along with the radio.

_That's life, I can't deny it,  
I thought of quitting,  
But my heart just won't buy it.  
If I didn't think it was worth a try,  
I'd roll myself up in a big ball and die_


End file.
